Gold, silver, pgms, mining and geopolitical comment and news

We are sad to report the passing of Paul Burton, Camborne School of Mines graduate, erstwhile colleague, long time presenter and moderator at many gold conferences and specialist on gold and gold stocks. Paul passed away in Cornwall UK on March 15th, after a long term battle with cancer which had returned aggressively after a period of remission.

Some years ago, when I was MD of Mining Journal, we hired Paul as editor of our gold publications and he quickly made his mark as an important contributor/expert on gold mining and gold companies worldwide setting him on course for his subsequent career. He took the publications with him as part of a severance package and the then World Gold Analyst and World Gold – which had developed from Mining Journals’ Quarterly Review of Gold Stocks, and the International Gold Mining Newsletter (originally started by yours truly!) – were important and relevant reading within the global gold community.

After a spell with GFMS as one of their gold experts (he was managing Director of GFMS World Gold) and following the take-over by Thomson Reuters, Paul became an independent analyst, setting up his own company, Piran Mining Research With his own company, he conducted specialist research, mostly on gold, for a number of companies as well as continuing to publish World Gold Analyst which continued to provide independent, online research on, and evaluations of, selected gold companies worldwide.

Paul will be sadly missed within the global gold community.

Funeral is at Penryn Chapel, Penryn, Cornwall on April 4th at 11.30 am

Of the various regular publications which I receive in my inbox, one of the most thought provoking is always Grant Williams’ ‘Things that make you go hmm..’ (www.ttmygh.com) newsletter, published roughly fortnightly. Grant always develops a theme for his exceedingly comprehensive commentaries – how he has the time and the imagination to do this to this degree of depth alongside his other work and interests I do not know – but his insights into aspects of the global economic picture are perhaps unsurpassed. His newsletters are always inclusive of a large number of illustrative charts and are backed up with excerpts of articles from, and interviews with, some other key commentators.

Grant is also much in demand as a speaker at conferences and his presentations should not be missed – they are filled with remarkable insights into global finance and always presented with a degree of humour sadly lacking from many of the other financial speeches at these events.

Grant’s latest newsletter is over 60 pages long and he takes the ‘Snakes and Ladders’ board game as his inspiration. According to the newsletter’s introduction, the game is one of the oldest board games known to man and has its origins in pre-Colonial India where it was called Moksha Patamu.

The game centres around the Hindu philosophy of Karma which is the spiritual principle of cause and effect whereby actions taken today will determine the nature of tomorrow’s consequential ramifications. Grant applies this philosophy to the various supposedly ‘economy-supportive’ programmes implemented by the U.S. Federal Reserve, and other central banks, over the past four decades where successive Fed chairmen have taken interest rates on a continuous downward path and are only now trying to redress the balance, but in the meantime have built up staggering volumes of debt. The problem with taking interest rates down to near zero is that that leaves the Fed with little interest rate lowering leeway should the economy teeter into the next almost inevitable financial crisis – hence the pressure to try and normalize rates before the next crisis strikes.

As Grant puts it though “For investors, the last 9 years has been one long, mostly pleasant climb up a nice, shallow ladder, however we’ve reached the point where the chances of stepping on a snake have reached a level which demands precautions be taken.”

Other commentators point to the fact that equity market investors represent only a small part of the population – the ‘already haves’ – but the years of investor prosperity have largely passed the general public by. The rich and the Wall Street elite have been getting richer, while the average person in the street remains relatively unaffected financially and continues to struggle and may even be persuaded to spend money they don’t have by optimistic media reporting, bordering on the euphoric, that the economy is extremely strong! It isn’t.

He also reckons that the new Fed Chairman, Jay Powell, has taken over and is ripe for what rugby players call a ‘hospital pass’. While Powell in the past has expressed opinions on Fed policy which Grant strongly agrees with, he may well also have inherited a situation under which he may have little immediate control given the scenario which has already been set in motion.

So how does one protect oneself from this particular snake should markets peak and start to slide. Equity markets, as is bitcoin, are essentially speculative, and have had a very good run, but have to be considered vulnerable to a major reversal. (Bitcoin has already seen such a move, halving in value, and, in our view, there could well be further pain ahead for bitcoin investors).

Thus, those with the wherewithal to do so might look at alternative perhaps more stable assets like gold, though to protect themselves should Karma strike and overbought markets lose ground substantially as many are predicting. This is particularly so as we appear to be transitioning from Quantitative Easing (QE) to Fed-implemented Quantitative Tightening (QT). That could be seen as a significant game-changer and trend reverser for the markets.

Grant goes one step further though in recommending gold stocks over physical gold and looking at commodities in general which he feels have been heavily oversold.

So his initial recommendations are go long gold mining stocks against physical metal (as represented by GLD) and against general equities which he sees as ripe for a major downwards correction (the next snake). He notes that the HUI Index of gold miners is at the same level it was in October 2000, when gold was trading at $265 and that with a current gold price of over $1,300 an ounce, and with the drastic improvements miners have been forced to make to their operations in the last 7 years, he expects gold miners to outperform the metal significantly. It’s not that he doesn’t rate physical gold investment positively, but that he feels that, for now, gold mining stocks have an even better growth potential.

He also feels that commodities in general have been underpriced. He thus suggests a thematic investment in the commodities sector could be well worthwhile thus capturing the overall thrust of his thinking revolving around a weak dollar in the long term, rising inflation and a Fed which will be forced to either hike rates to choke off inflation or embark on another round of monetary profligacy in the face of a recession triggered by its own policies.

He does have a caveat, though, in that the dollar may try to move swiftly higher in the short-term, but that he doesn’t see this continuing for long and, utilising the words of ice hockey player Wayne Gretsky feels that this positions him for where the puck is going – not necessarily where it is today.

The Many Uses of Gold

As our loyal readers know, at U.S. Global Investors we carefully monitor the price of gold. We pay close attention to the macro drivers moving the yellow metal, like government policy and cultural affinity spurring demand globally. We also monitor the micro drivers, like company management and quant factors that make one gold stock superior to the next.

Gold’s qualities make it one of the most coveted metals in the world and a popular gift in the form of jewelry – this is what I call the Love Trade. From the beginning of the Indian wedding season in September until Chinese New Year in February, the price of gold tends to rise due to higher demand from the two biggest consumers of gold, China and India.

On the other hand is the Fear Trade, driven by negative real interest rates and the fear of poor government or central bank policies that could result in currency devaluation or inflation. This fear triggers people to buy gold as a hedge against possible negative returns in other asset classes, which in turn, pushes the gold price higher.

Gold in a Portfolio

We believe gold is an essential part of a portfolio due to its history as a protector against inflation. I’ve always recommended a 10 percent weighting in the metal, 5 percent in gold bullion or jewelry, and 5 percent in gold stocks, mutual funds and ETFs.

In fact, current economic conditions make an even greater case for gold. The stock market is still on a historic bull run, and the tax reform bill is helping ratchet up share prices. It’s important to remember that the precious metal has historically shared a low-to-negative correlation with equities. For the past 30 years, the average correlation between the LBMA gold price and the S&P 500 Index has been negative 0.06.

Gold has also performed competitively against many asset classes over the past few decades, as seen in the chart below. This makes the metal, we believe, an appealing diversifier in the event of a correction in the capital markets or an end to the bull market.

Our investment team brings knowledge and experience in a variety of fields, with one of the most notable being gold. As such, we have written numerous pieces about the precious metal. One of our most popular is the Many Uses of Gold slideshow that outlines eight different uses of gold, other than in your portfolio. From dentistry to electronics and space travel to currency, gold remains widely used in everyday life.

We believe it’s important to truly understand the asset class you are investing in, and we hope this slideshow does just that. Explore gold’s many uses here!

However, I also write occasional articles for U.S. site – www.usgoldbureau.com, but this site is blocked for access from outside North America unless one uses a browser, like Tor, which can be set to mimic access from other countries. So for North American readers, or Tor users, a link to my latest article on this site follows:

Article first posted today on sharpspixley.com

Now March is with us we are beginning to receive reasonably accurate figures on 2017 gold production around the world and the bi g question is is peak gold here or not. The answer is maybe. According to the World Gold Council’s figures, global gold output actually increased in 2017, but by such a small margin that it should probably be considered flat at 3,267 tonnes – as compared with 3,260 tonnes a year earlier – a tiny 0.2% increase and with global output continuing to trend downwards we can probably assume that 2017 was indeed the year of peak gold.

But, there is much variation between national outputs. While the world’s largest gold producer – China – is estimated to have seen its gold output fall by 9-10%, the world’s second, third and fourth largest miners – Australia, Russia and the USA have reportedly seen their annual gold production increase, but perhaps by not as much in combination as the fall in Chinese output.

As to the actual figures it all comes down to the accuracy of those reporting. China’s output reportedly fell to 430 tonnes from over 460 tonnes in 2017.

There is an argument ongoing as to which nation is currently the world’s second largest gold producer. In 2016 it was Australia with 287 tonnes while Russia was in 3rd place with 274 tonnes. Australian consultancy, Surbiton Associate which tends to produce very accurate figures on Australia reports 2017 Australian production at 301 tonnes, a good increase on 2016, and avers Australia remains the world’s second largest producer of gold. However, as we reported here three weeks ago (See: Russia may now be World No. 2 Gold Miner), the Russian Finance Ministry stated that Russian gold output in 2017 was a little over 306 tonnes which would put it ahead of Australia as the World No.2. Reports also suggest that gold output from other top producers Canada and Peru grew in 2017, while that of the former No.1 gold miner, South Africa continued to fall by nearly 4% last year according to that country’s Bureau of Statistics.

But the actual league table of producers is probably immaterial – it is the overall figure which counts and that does suggest that global gold production has, at the very least, plateaued. Cutbacks on gold exploration and big new capital projects, as the lower gold prices after the 2012 peak caused the big mining companies to rethink their expansion plans and capital expenditures, are taking their toll. Most of the big miners are predicting short term production falls after a number of years of ‘growth at any cost’.

Back to Australia and the latest Surbiton Associates assessment though: Australian gold mine production in calendar 2017 resultedin the highest annual output since 1999. Total gold mine output in 2017 reached 301 tonnes or almost 9.7 million ounces, up three tonnes on calendar 2016. Production in the December quarter 2017 totalled some 80 tonnes, up six tonnes on the previous quarter.

“At the average gold price for 2017, the 301 tonnes was worth almost A$16 billion,” said Dr Sandra Close, a Surbiton Associates’ director. “Australian gold production is still trending upwards and the next few years look promising.”

“The higher output in the December quarter was due to a number of factors including the strong recovery at Newcrest’s Cadia East mine near Orange, NSW which was almost 60,000 ounces higher,” Dr Close said. “Other operations with higher output included the Super Pit’s increase of 28,000 ounces, Peak up 21,000 ounces and Tropicana up 19,000 ounces.

“Further out, development of the Gold Fields and Gold Road Resources’ Gruyere joint venture in WA is one-third complete, with the start of mining scheduled for late this year,” Dr Close said. “The operation will commence in early 2019 at a rate of around 270,000 ounces of gold per year when in full production.”

The only closure of note was Doray Minerals’ Andy Well mine. It commenced production in 2013 and was placed on care and maintenance in early November, after producing about 40,000 ounces in 2017.

“Given the number of projects coming on stream and with few closures anticipated, it would not be surprising to see another 20 tonnes of production added to Australia’s annual output,” Dr Close said. “This suggests that Australia’s all-time record annual gold production of 314 tonnes recorded in 1997 might well be exceeded.”

She said however, that despite the generally upward trend anticipated, production will probably decline in the March quarter 2018 due to wet weather in Western Australia which is a common occurrence early in the year.

As noted above, Surbiton estimates thst Australia remains the world’s second largest gold producer behind China which produced an estimated 4300 tonnes in 2017.

Article firsT posted on sharpSpixley.com

Gold investors should be looking at gold for the long term. Demand growth fundamentals are looking positive to this writer, while there is, in parallel, the prospect of diminishing supply. It is the combination of these factors that makes gold so appealing in the medium and long term. Even in the short term the general consensus among many analysts is that the gold price will likely rise as well – perhaps not by much but many are predicting a $1,400 gold price, or higher, by the year end. The recent price drop is seen as a blip in an overall upwards path for the yellow metal.

The big factor to take into account is the sustained move into the middle class earnings category in the world’s biggest population nations – China and India – both of which currently have around 1.3 billion people. By contrast the USA only has a population of some 320 million and is currently experiencing very slow population growth.

By contrast, China, currently the world’s largest gold consumer, is seeing huge growth in numbers entering the middle class classification. Total population is estimated at over four times that of the USA. Major, and well respected, consultancy McKinsey recently went on record as predicting that by 2022, 76% of China’s urban population will have moved into the middle class bracket. That nation’s urban population numbers around 750 million, so 76% represents around 570 million people in what McKinsey describes as the middle class earnings bracket – more than one and three quarter times the total population of the USA. McKinsey, however, classifies the Chinese middle class as urban households earning between US$9,000 and US$34,000 annually – which may seem low by U.S. standards, but purchasing priorities tend to be hugely different with many Chinese middle class families, even at the lower end of this income bracket, buying small amounts of gold on a regular basis as their prime savings mechanism. The Chinese banks make this an easy process.

In the West gold is mostly seen as a tradable asset and is perhaps more readily sold as and when the price rises. There are some in the West, notably large investors, who may see gold as a safe haven form of wealth protection, but in China that tends to be the norm rather than the exception and gold holdings there tend to be, consequently, in firmer hands than in the West and only released back into the market in cases of dire need. Gold may also be held as jewellery and artefacts which, again in the East, tends to be a realistic option because price mark-ups are very low.

The gold purchase pattern in India, the world’s No. 2 gold consumer, somewhat mirrors that of China, although probably coming from a lower base. But the birth rate is higher and the total population is set to exceed that of China in the next year or so – it may already have – and continue to grow at a significant rate. Gold hoarding is an integral part of the Indian psyche, perhaps more so than anywhere else in the world, so it wouldn’t surprise us to see Indian gold demand move back above that of China in the next few years, despite the government’s attempts to thwart this because gold imports are a substantial component of the country’s current account deficit! This year we have already seen a recovery in Indian gold imports to over 900 tonnes after an exceptional low of just over 580 tonnes in 2016. The 2017 figure is still below those of 2010-2012 and 2015, but is indicative of a possible return to the old higher levels.

As a proxy for gold flows from West to East we only have to look at Swiss gold export figures with around 80% of these gold exports tending to be destined for Asia and the Middle East. The Swiss figures are particularly significant because the Swiss gold refineries provide the key conduit for converting doré (impure) bullion, received from mines around the world, and large gold bars (mostly imported from the UK) into the small bar and wafer sizes in demand in the East. Overall, Swiss refineries currently process a volume equivalent to around two-thirds of global new-mined global gold output annually. These huge gold flow percentages are indicative of the total gold flows leaving depositories in the West for stronger hands in the East. Sooner or later these will generate a shortage in the West which will ultimately positively impact prices beyond the capabilities of the powers-that-be to hold them down.

Asian and Middle Eastern demand alone would seem to be more than sufficient to keep the gold train rolling, but it is all in addition to some still decent gold demand throughout the rest of the world. When the gold price came down from its 2012 peak, supply was boosted by huge liquidations of gold out of the big gold ETFs, but this source of supply has dried up and, if anything, gold is beginning to flow back into the ETFs – perhaps not at a high rate but the overall flow has very definitely seen a reversal to the positivel.

At the same time, the volume of new mined gold supply at around 3,200 metric tons a year, may well be beginning to fall . Peak gold may well be with us. The drop in the gold price following its 2012 peak led to cutbacks in capital projects and gold exploration around the world. While any output decline may be very slow at the moment, with some countries like Russia, Australia and Canada still seeing growing new mined supplies, the overall global trend is definitely downwards. It will take the industry some time – and probably much higher prices – to recover from this downtrend in output, particularly given the long lead times in bringing a new mine into production from scratch.

So, the twin effects of continuing high demand (in the East in particular) driven by the growth in the middle classes in the high population countries like China and India, coupled with a decline in new mined gold production – seen as likely to accelerate – are likely to increasingly put a strain on the supply/demand balance. This may not initially lead to a big price boost for gold, but it should keep prices rising at least gradually over the years ahead. Should the equities markets and bitcoin collapse, as many experts are predicting, then this could drive more investment into perceived safe havens like gold.

Looking at these gold fundamentals, the prospects for gold over the next few years look good – and given gold’s propensity to react positively to disruptive global geopolitical and geo-economic events we could even see much bigger increases than the general picture, as noted above, might suggest.

Mike Gleason* of Money Metals Exchangeinterviews Michael Pento who is predicting an eventual crash in fiat currencies and a parallel take-off in precious metals. As Mike says in his introduction, Coming up we’ll hear a tremendous interview with Michael Pento of Pento Portfolio Strategies. Michael shares his very troubling outlook for the 10-year Treasury note, the tipping point that will cause the destruction of confidence in the dollar and what this all means for gold prices.

Mike Gleason: It is my privilege now to welcome back Michael Pento, president and founder of Pento Portfolio Strategies, and author of the book The Coming Bond Market Collapse: How to Survive the Demise of the U.S. Debt Market.

Michael is a well-known money manager and a fantastic market commentator, and over the past few years has been a wonderful guest and one of our favorite interviews here on the Money Metals Podcast and we always enjoy getting his Austrian economist viewpoint.

Michael, welcome back and thanks for joining us again.

Michael Pento: What a great introduction. Thanks for having me back on, Mike.

Mike Gleason: Well, we often talk about bond yields with you, Michael, and I think that’s a good place to start today. You recently published an article where you made the case that 4% would be the floor when it comes to the 10-year note – not the ceiling, the floor, and you made some observations that now seem striking. The yield on that note averaged 4.6% in 2007, just the year before the 2008 financial crisis.

Today practically nobody remembers yields ever being that high… 10 years is a long time we suppose. Heck, it seems like investors have already forgotten the early February selloff in the equities market, so I guess we can’t be surprised that they can’t remember the situation a decade ago.

In any event, markets are not prepared, or priced for 4% yields on the 10-year. Talk a bit about why 4% is likely to be a minimum and why yields should probably be much higher than that.

Michael Pento: Let’s start with the fact that normally speaking throughout history, the 10-year note seems to run with nominal GDP growth, which is basically your real growth plus inflation. So, if we’re running around 2% inflation and we have growth at 2.5% around that, you would assume that the 10-year note should be historically speaking around 4.5% right now. But I can make a very cogent argument, Mike, that rates should be much, much higher because if you look back … as you mentioned the 2007 when that average interest rate was, again, 4.6% and nominal GDP was sort of around that same ballpark, the annual deficit was 1.1% of GDP.

But going into fiscal 2019… sounds far away, not maybe that far away, but it sounds further away than really what it is. It begins in October of this year. Our annual amount of red ink will be $1.2 trillion. That is the Treasury’s annual deficit, but you have to add to that to the fact that the central bank of the United States will be selling… and I say selling, because what they don’t buy the Treasury must issue to the public, $600 billion less of Treasury Bonds. So, that’s $1.8 trillion deficit. That has never before happened in the history of mankind, a $1.8 trillion deficit, which happens to be 8.6% of our phony GDP if we don’t go into a recession.

If we go into a recession anytime in the near future, and I don’t think the business cycle has been outlawed, then we’re talking about $3 trillion annual deficits. Let’s just take the 1.8 which is 8.6% of GDP. Why would the 10-year note not go to at least 4.5% where nominal GDP is? It would probably go much higher, especially even the fact that back in 2007 we had $5.1 trillion dollars of publicly traded debt, but not we have $15 trillion dollars of publicly traded debt. So over above the fact that the Fed’s balance sheet went from $700 billion to $4.5 trillion; it’s $4.4 trillion right now.

But you still have $4.5 trillion that they hold, but guess what? There’s an extra … what’s that, $11 trillion of publicly traded debt that has to be absorbed by private bond holders? So deficits are exploding. The amount of publicly traded debt has exploded. And there isn’t any reason, and there isn’t any rationale. Central banks are getting out of the bond buying business so there isn’t any cohesion, rationale, for rates not to not only normalize but be much higher than they were normally.

Let’s just say they normalize… 4.6%, 4.5%, maybe higher than that. By the way, let me just add this quickly Mike, the average interest rate going on a 10-year note going back since 1969 is over 7%. So, the interest rate on the 10-year right now is 2.88%. It is going to not only go up much higher, but it’s going to rise dramatically, probably towards the end of this year as the ECB, European Central Bank gets out of their QE. They’ll be ending QE by the end of this year.

So then you’ll have only the Bank of Japan in the bond buying business. So, yields are going up … and I’ll let you in after this one more comment … if the yield on a 10-year note goes from 2.8 … and don’t forget … it was 1.4. Now it’s 2.88 or 2.9, it’s going to go to 4.5 very quickly in my opinion. Probably by the end of this year, unless we have a recession and a stock market collapse.

Where do you think junk bonds will be? The average yield on junk bonds is 5%… a little bit over 5%. So, junk bond yields are going to spike. That means that prices are going to plummet. And my god, you’re talking about a complete blow-up of the income market across the spectrum, especially in the riskiest part of it. Just like subprime mortgages. So buckle your seat belts, the low-volatility regime is dead and gone.

Mike Gleason: The housing market is a very big part of the economy and that’s tied to the 10-year and it’s likely to get crushed. And honestly that’s just the most direct example, but honestly there is so much in our financial world, as you just alluded to, that’s dictated by that treasury note. So, if people are ever wondering why you talk so much about these bond rates it’s because it’s so vitally important, isn’t it Michael?

Michael Pento: Absolutely. You have not only junk bonds, you’ve got collateralized bonds, you’ve got collateralized loan obligations, leverage loans, private equity deals … you have the risk-free rate of return, sovereign debt, taken to 1.4% and that was in the summer of 2016. So, let’s just say, that if I’m correct, it goes to 4.4%. So, the 10-year note goes from 1.4 to 4.4 just at 300 basis point increase in yields leads to a 24% plunge in your principle.

So, if you lose a quarter of your net worth that you have in bonds in the risk-free treasury, imagine what your loss will be in leverage loans, COOs, junk bonds, muni bonds, equities, real estate, REITS, I mean you could go on and on. Everything is based off of that risk-free rate of return, which by the way, if hedge fund’s rate was 0% for almost 9 years, and a German bund into 0.7%, it was negative for many years, people in corporations in Europe were floating debt with a negative yield, so you had the biggest bond bubble in history that’s slamming into the hugest gargantuan increase in debt in history. And when those things meet, it’s an awful deadly cocktail.

So, like I said, buckle your seat belts because this is going to be one hell of a year coming up. It already has been and it’s only going to intensify.

Mike Gleason: Now with that said, there are some that argue that the Fed will not let yields move that high, they simply cannot. Officials there know well what will happen to growth and to the federal budget if rates should rise so do you think the Fed will intervene and can they continue to keep rates capped indefinitely?

Michael Pento: Well if you listen to the new Fed chair Jerome Powell, testifying yesterday saying he’s so ebullient and upbeat about the stock market and the economy. I don’t know what he’s looking at, I mean we had two quarters in a row at 3%, now the 4th quarter came in at 2.5%.

If you listen to the Atlanta Fed, they started Q1 at 4.5% now it’s down to 2.6%. So I don’t know where the excitement is about GDP. I don’t know where it’s coming from. You mentioned housing, if you look at pending home sales it’s 4.7% down. It was announced this morning. All the other data on all prices is heading south, including existing home sales and new home sales. And that’s only when we had a slight uptick in interest rates.

People talk about how beneficial the tax cuts are, but they forgot about the other side of the equation which is rising rates. Rising debt service costs are erasing any and all benefits that’s coming from the tax plan. So, what we’re seeing now in the economy is a sugar high, an adrenalin shot. But going towards the end of this year I fully expect the economy to fall out of bed.

And Jerome Powell who is still upbeat on the stock market and the economy, he’s going to have to change his tune. But what happens when you change your tune, is the Fed is going to have to admit, Mike, that they had the mistake. In other words, their 9 year experiment in Quantitative Easings, and huge increase in the size of the balance sheet, failed to rescue the economy. And instead of being able to ever normalize interest rates … this is why this watershed epiphany is going to be so hard for the Fed to admit … they’re going to have to admit that all of their manipulations failed to provide viable and sustainable economic growth.

And then they’re going to have to change course, because as you said, if interest rates rise and rise they must, and we’re paying all this extra interest on this debt. And they’ll say well, we have to cap interest rates from rising, this is a watershed epiphany that they’re very much loathe to admit. Because if you change your tune at 5.25% on a Fed funds rate as they did in 2008, that’s one thing. But if you change your tune when interest rates on the Fed funds rate … the effect on Fed funds rate is 1.4% as it is today … that’s a totally different story. You’re not only going to have to take back your 150 basis points of rate hikes, but then you have to go right back into QE, you have to admit that you can never drain your balance sheet, you have to admit that interest rates can never normalize.

Do you know what that would do to the currency? Do you know what that would do to the price of precious metals? Do you know what that would do to the fate of the stock market and the state of the treasury? So, all these things are going to be loath to admit but they will have to come back into QE as the stock market and the economy plunges. And then it’s game over. I think the faith in fiat currencies goes away and it’s going to end very quickly, and it’s probably going to start by the end of this year.

Mike Gleason: Yeah it’s certainly a hyper-inflationary type of scenario could play out there if all that comes to pass for sure. I was recently watching an interview you did with legendary investor Jim Rodgers, which was really great and very fascinating by the way, and you guys were talking about ETFs and the dangers that those funds may pose the next time equity investors rush for the exits.

You made some really great points. Now back in 2008 the markets were crushed by derivatives – securities so complex that lots of people who were on them didn’t understand what was in them or how they might perform. These days the markets may be at risk from exchange traded funds which are designed to make investing simple.

Please explain why you were so concerned about ETFs and their increasing dominance in the markets, and how a sell-off could be made much worse by the fact that so many people are invested in these things.

Michael Pento: Well you look at what happened with inverse volatility trade. I’m sure you guys are aware of what happened there. So, people were lulled to sleep in the stock market, believing that the only direction that stocks can go is up. Because there was no other alternative. You take yields to 0%, leave them there for 9 years, and of course people are going to go out, way out, along the risk curve.

So, people were actually saying to themselves after a while, hey, why don’t I just short volatility? Well the problem is, when everybody shorts volatility, is that when volatility spikes by 100%, inverse vol goes to zero. And that wiped out billions of dollars of net worth, pretty much in hours. And it’s not exactly the same thing, but that same concept is now in play with the ETF’s spectrum. So, 9 years, 0% interest rates, everybody went into passive ETF funds, by the way Mike, a lot of these funds own very much the same securities. So, Amazon, Facebook, Netflix, Google, Apple, these are all contained in various weightings in all of these passive ETFs. Or much of them.

So what happens is you have passive ETFs ownership, which has gone off the charts, as well as a huge surge, a gargantuan increase, in passive ETFs that are leveraged to the bond market. So you have ETFs that own bonds, that are long bonds, ETFs that are long, high-yield junk, ETFs that are long the same securities. And when everybody hits the exit door at once, as they did with these inverse volatility trades, they will blow up.

So you try to redeem the ETFs. The ETFs in turn have to redeem the underlying securities, which in turn causes the ETF’s value to fall, so it’s a vicious cycle, a downward spiral. And that’s what I’m afraid is going to happen. Because you have globe investors to sleep by 9 years of inculcation that yields can only go down and prices on bonds and equities can only go up. And when that changes, and it could change violently as yields start to rise, then you’re going to have this implosion in pretty much everything … you had bubble in everything, you’re going to have an implosion in everything.

That’s the real danger. I’m not a Cassandra. I was way out in front of the spectrum of all these perma-bulls in 2007 and in the year 2000, I warned about the housing market in 2005 and 2006. So, I have a history of identifying these problems. I have said for the last few years that you cannot construct a healthy, viable economy by taking interest rates to 0 and leaving them there for years.

And also increasing a massive amount of debt… $230 trillion dollars, 330% of GDP. That is the total amount of debt in the globe today. Up $70 trillion dollars since the great recession. While you’ve taken interest rates and deformed the whole risk spectrum, while you’ve increased debt, you’ve also blown up the biggest asset bubble in equities ever. So, we’re now at 150%, 1.5 times. The market cap of equities are now 1.5 times the underlying economy.

That has never before happened in history. It was only reached about that same level in March of 2000. This is a dangerous bubble and it’s going to burst, and you and your investors need to be aware of how dangerous it is. And you should also understand if you’re going to invest, you should have somebody that understands this dynamic now and can at least try to profit from the 3rd, 50%+ plunge in prices since the year 2000.

Mike Gleason: Yeah a very troubling set up for sure. Well as we begin to close here Michael, I wanted to talk to you about gold and silver. They’re often viewed as safe havens, and in the aforementioned scenario you got to think metals would get a boost. But if we go back to the last financial crisis, they did get taken down, gold and silver, they did get taken down with equities although they bounced back much sooner.

However, leading up to the fall of ‘08, we had a pretty hot commodities market that drove metals up in the preceding few years, but this time metals have been languishing a bit and seem cheap compared to everything else. So, what do you see happening in the metals markets this time around during a big stock market crash, if and when we do get one?

Michael Pento: So, you know Mike that I love gold, I think it’s going to be supplanting fiat currencies after the debacle ensues. But I’m underweight gold in the portfolio now. You once talked about 2008, what happened in 2008 don’t forget. If you remember back then we had the BRICs trade going. So people were short dollars and long Brazil, Russia, India, China currencies. So, when people became aware that the stock market globally … and economies globally and real estate market globally … was going to tank, they had to close out that carry trade, which involved buying dollars.

That trade is not prevalent today, so I don’t think gold is going to get hurt the next time this happens. But I’m underweight gold now, precisely, because while the dollar does stand to weaken because of these massive trade deficits … we have huge trade deficits, in fact the last one came out at minus $74 billion dollars for one month of goods and services in the deficit … we also have, and I mentioned it, the massive debt. That’s very negative for the dollar and positive for gold. What we have on the negative side for gold is rising nominal and real interest rates. So that is never good for gold. So, there’s a battle on right now, it’s like this $1,300 to $1,350 kind of battle. You see gold tries to get higher and then you realize well, rising rates are not very good for gold, and then it starts to fall and you realize that hey, a falling dollar is really good for gold, so it’s kind of caught in this trading range of ignominy.

But that all ends when that epiphany, that watershed moment comes from the Federal Reserve that yes, we have to stop draining our balance sheet, and we must reduce the federal funds rate. And then I think, as I said, fiat currencies get flushed down the toilet and there’s going to be a mad rush into gold like you’ve never seen before. Because what’s going to happen is you’re going to have bond prices and equities tanking simultaneously. And people will be fleeing to gold, flocking to gold, in the realization that normalization in the interest rate spectrum, normalization in the economy, is not going to be able to be achieved any time in the near future.

Mike Gleason: It’ll certainly be interesting to see if you could get your hands on it in that sort of a mad rush of retail investors trying to get gold. Right now, we’ve got a lot of access to inventory and it’s on sale still so people should heed that warning.

Well we appreciate it as always Michael, it’s great having you on once again and we always love getting your insights. Now before we let you go, as we always do, please tell people about how they can both read and hear more of your wonderful market commentaries and also learn about your firm and how they could potentially become a client if they want to do that.

Michael Pento: Well thank you. It’s Pento Portfolio Strategies, PentoPort.com. My email address is mpento@pentoport.com. The office number here is 732-772-9500 give us a call, we won’t bite. And please subscribe to my podcast, its only $49.99 a year and it gives you my ideas on a weekly basis, kind of analysis of economics and markets that you won’t find anywhere else.

Mike Gleason: Yeah it’s truly great stuff. Michael is somebody that I’ve been following for a long time, we always love having his comments here on the podcast, and we certainly appreciate it and look forward to catching up with you again before long. Thanks very much for all you do Michael.

Michael Pento: Thank you, Mike.

Mike Gleason: Well that will wrap it up for this week, thanks again to Michael Pento of Pento Portfolio Strategies. For more information visit PentoPort.com. You can sign up for his email list, listen to his mid-week podcast and get his fantastic marking commentaries on a regular basis. Again, just go to PentoPort.com.

And don’t forget to tune in here next Friday for next Weekly Market Wrap Podcast, until then this has been Mike Gleason with Money Metals Exchange, thanks for listening and have a great weekend everybody.

*About the Author:

Mike Gleason is a Director with Money Metals Exchange, a national precious metals dealer with over 50,000 customers. Gleason is a hard money advocate and a strong proponent of personal liberty, limited government and the Austrian School of Economics. A graduate of the University of Florida, Gleason has extensive experience in management, sales and logistics as well as precious metals investing. He also puts his longtime broadcasting background to good use, hosting a weekly precious metals podcast since 2011, a program listened to by tens of thousands each week.

Bullion investors buy gold and silver as a matter of self-reliance. Physical metals aren’t dependent upon the promises of financial institutions, governments, or other third parties.

This lack of counterparty risk makes precious metals quite different from most conventional assets. There is no possibility of a default or mismanagement which renders them worthless. That is a lot more than can be said of securities such as stocks and bonds.

Recently, in the USA, a few firms promoting “self storage” precious metals IRAs have been trying to exploit the self-reliance streak running through bullion investors in a manner that could cause significant harm.

These firms offer a scheme to circumvent IRS rules which require IRA metals be stored by a third party, and some people are biting. The desire to have possession and control of the metals appears to be outweighing good sense.

The warnings are piling up. Last week, the Industry Council on Tangible Assets issued the latest warning about storing IRA metals at home.

The trouble is rooted in the IRS requirement that assets in your retirement account be held by a third party.

Some firms have begun offering a dangerous work-around. They help investors create an LLC company which they claim will fill the role of the third party. The LLC buys and holds the metals, and the IRA holder manages the LLC.

IRS officials have already signaled that they see the formation of the LLC as a simple fiction to grant control over assets which are supposed to kept at arm’s length. ”Self storage” IRA holders seem likely to find their accounts disqualified, with taxes and penalties due immediately (as an early distribution of the full account balance).

As one expert frames it; “you can own a bakery with your IRA, but you cannot be the baker.” Owning a business with your self-directed IRA is okay. Hiring yourself and paying a salary is a definite no-no. Likewise it is perfectly fine to buy investment real estate, but your IRA cannot purchase your personal residence.

IRA promoters are offering LLC or “checkbook” IRAs despite knowing the program has not been defended successfully in court. It certainly does not have the blessing of the IRS.

In fact, the IRS is explicitly warning people. Forbes reports the agency was asked about ads promoting these types of IRAs: “The IRS cannot comment on claims made by any particular IRA promoter, but the agency warns taxpayers to be wary of anyone claiming that gold held in your IRA can be stored at home or in a safety deposit box.”

It appears to be only a matter of time before the IRS starts nailing such account holders to the wall. If so, IRA account holders will be faced difficult choice; pay the tax and penalty or hire an attorney and try to defend the scheme in court.

If there is any certainty, it’s that the promoters behind this type of IRA will not be picking up these costs.

Anyone reading the fine print will find they disclaim responsibility, even though they are happy to collect a handsome fee for assisting investors with setup.

More than that, we’ve also noticed that the promoters of the “home storage” IRA scheme also tend to steer investors into rip-off “collectible” coins, especially Proof Gold Eagles and Proof Silver Eagles. These coins are eligible to be held in IRAs but give the dealer a huge profit margin at the expense of the buyer.

It’s telling that a few promoters of these risky “home storage” IRAs are also the bad actors when it comes to what products they promote. They aren’t really looking out for their customers.

There are plenty of great reasons to hold precious metals in an IRA, just be sure to do it right. Find a reputable trustee, such as New Direction IRA, and store the metal in a secure, audited vault that is not connected to the banking system and offers physically segregated accounts, such as Money Metals Depository.

Gold and silver bullion are a great way to reduce counterparty risk. The last thing investors want is to find the IRS is their counterparty!

*About the Author:

Clint Siegner is a Director at Money Metals Exchange, the national precious metals company named 2015 “Dealer of the Year” in the United States by an independent global ratings group. A graduate of Linfield College in Oregon, Siegner puts his experience in business management along with his passion for personal liberty, limited government, and honest money into the development of Money Metals’ brand and reach. This includes writing extensively on the bullion markets and their intersection with policy and world affairs.

In its outlook for 2018, Thomson Reuters GFMS analysts see gold prices rising to $1,500 an ounce sometime this year on inflation fears. This would put gold at a level unseen since April 2013.

According to Thomson Reuters, the price appreciation could be driven by “concerns that the United States may pull out of NAFTA,” or the North American Free Trade Agreement. NAFTA, of course, is the trade pact the U.S. shares with Canada and Mexico, its number two and three largest trading partners.

The Trump administration has already imposed tariffs on Canadian softwood lumber, and more recently it set steep tariffs on imported washing machines and solar panels—all of which is inflationary. The same thing goes for the recently-passed tax overhaul, which has prompted some companies such as Walmart and Starbucks to raise their minimum wage.

But if the administration were to withdraw the U.S. from NAFTA, as President Donald Trump has hinted at numerous times, prices on consumer goods and services could become destabilized and begin to surge.

In anticipation of this, investors might want to consider adding to their gold exposure, which has a history of performing well in times of rising inflation.

Gold Has Helped Preserve and Grow Capital in Times of Rising Inflation

The chart below, courtesy of the World Gold Council (WGC), shows that annual gold returns were around 15 percent on average in years when inflation was 3 percent or higher year-over-year, between 1970 and 2017. In real, or inflation-adjusted, terms, returns were closer to 8 percent. This is still higher, though, than average returns in years when inflation was lower.

According to the WGC, “gold returns have outpaced the U.S. consumer price index (CPI) over the long run, due to its many sources of demand. Gold has not just preserved capital, it has helped it grow.”

Having a 5 to 10 percent weighting in gold and gold stocks, then, could help investors minimize their losses in other asset classes.

Dollar Weakness Also Driving Gold Prices

Tariffs and higher wages aren’t the only Fear Trade factors moving gold prices right now. A weaker U.S. dollar, relative to other global currencies, deserves a lot of the credit as well.

For the past several weeks, the greenback has plunged in value, dipping more than 1 percent last Wednesday alone—its biggest one-day pullback in 10 months. This came following Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s comment at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, that a weaker dollar “is good for us as it’s related to trade and opportunities.” The greenback similarly tanked back in April 2017 when President Trump said the dollar is “getting too strong.” Soon after, it fell below its 200-day moving average.

Last Thursday, however, Trump walked back Mnuchin’s (and his own) comment, telling CNBC that the dollar “is going to get stronger and stronger, and ultimately I want to see a strong dollar.”

In any case, the year-long decline has been a short-term tailwind for gold, which is priced in U.S. dollars and, therefore, becomes less expensive for foreign buyers when it sinks. We believe the greenback peaked last January and that we could see further depreciation.

How to Play the Rally

One of the best ways to gain exposure to the gold space, we believe, is with the U.S. Global GO GOLD and Precious Metal Miners ETF (GOAU). The fund provides access to companies engaged in the production of precious metals not only through active means—mining, for instance—but passive means as well. That includes gold and precious metal royalty companies, which provide upfront cash to producers to develop a project. In return, they receive royalties or rights to a “stream,” an agreed-upon amount of gold, silver or other precious metal at a lower-than-market price.

We believe this is a superior business model, which is why 30 percent of GOAU is weighted in gold royalty names. These companies have exposure to precious metals but have managed to remain profitable even when prices are down. Because they’re not directly responsible for building and maintaining mines and other costly infrastructure, huge operating expenses can be avoided. They also hold highly diversified portfolios of mines and other assets, which helps mitigate concentration risk in the event that one of the properties stops producing. As a result, royalty companies have enjoyed a much lower breakeven cost than traditional miners.

Compared to many other companies in the mining space, royalty companies have tended to be better allocators of capital, taking on very little debt and deploying cash reserves only at the most opportune times.

Another of my articles published on the Sharps Pixley website looks at total gold exports from Switzerland last year – the lowest level for 11 years, but still substantial at 1,600 tonnes. As has been apparent throughout the year over 80% of the gold routed through Switzerland has been headed for relatively strong hands in Asia and the Middle East, and taken together with gold production in Asia in particular – mostly China, but also in countries like Indonesia which is a significant producer in its own right (No. 9 in the world in 2016) [see:World Top 20 Gold: Countries, Companies and Mines]– these areas probably account for the accumulation of more than 80% of all the world’s newly mined gold. China in particular absorbs goldlike a sponge and doesn’t release it back into the global market place.

With Asian populations growing, gold demand will continue to rise there given the propensity for the citizenry to own gold, while peak newly mined gold is almost certainly already with us we are going to see supplies squeezed in the years ahead with a consequent positive effect on the price regardless of the powers that be trying to suppress it. Switzerland’s re-refining and expoirt business thus remains an excellent pointer to current and future gold flows.

The continued accumulation of physical gold in Asia and the Middle East goes on regardless as shown by gold exports from Switzerland – the leading national conduit for gold bullion. Switzerland has achieved this position through its refineries specialising in taking gold in unmarketable forms and importing dore bullion from mines and refining, or re-refining it into the sizes and purities in demand in the eastern market place. This is combined with the great reputation of Switzerland in the gold marketplace and as a conduit for such activities.

Although Swiss gold exports in 2017 were the lowest in 11 years they were still substantial at over 1,600 tonnes. That is equivalent to half the world’s annual new mined gold output, and with China the world’s largest gold miner already, and a known non-exporter, the Asian and Middle Eastern regions will have accumulated at least 65% of global gold output adding up the imports from Switzerland plus Chinese domestic production alone. But other countries also export gold directly to Asian and Middle Eastern refineries and we would guesstimate that perhaps 80% of all the gold bullion moving around the world may be ending up in these regions – a huge proportion of what remains the world’s No.1 monetary asset (in our opinion at least). With bitcoin continuing to crash – it has lost almost 60% of its value from its peak in December and could well crash much further as scared investors offload on the way down – gold may be again coming into its own as a key investment asset class in the minds of investors seeking to preserve their wealth.

In December, Swiss gold exports followed the pattern established over the year with India the no. 1 individual destination with 32.3 tonnes – or around 21.5% of the total – closely followed by China (25.7 tonnes) and Hong Kong (21.1 tonnes). Assuming that most, if not all, the Hong Kong exports are also bound for the Chinese mainland, greater China was thus the biggest recipient of the Swiss gold. Overall around 86% of Switzerland’s December gold exports (totalling 150.4 tonnes) was destined for Asian and Middle Eastern nations.

If we look at the full year 20i7 figures for Swiss gold exports – neatly laid out in the bar chart below from Nick laird’s www.goldchartsrus service – we see that these proportions pretty well mimic the full annual picture:

This chart shows that over the full year around 81.6% of the Swiss gold was headed for Asia and the Middle East with India the biggest individual national importer with 26.2%, but with China and Hong Kong combined taking 35.8%.

The other point which is apparent from the Swiss gold export figures is something we have stressed continually over the past year – that Hong Kong gold exports to mainland China can no longer be seen as a proxy for Chinese gold imports – or even a rough guide. Mainstream media, and some analysts who should know better, still seem to equate the regularly published Hong Kong gold export figures as such, but as the Swiss figures show the greater part of mainland China’s gold imports now comes in direct – avoiding Hong Kong altogether. This percentage of direct imports appears to be growing.

The figures also show that there has been a major recovery in Indian gold imports last year after a very low 2016 figure, but still Greater China remains comfortably the biggest importer – and if you add China’s own gold production of perhaps 450 tonnes last year into the mix, as well as direct imports from a number of other countries, China remains easily the world’s No. 1 accumulator of gold – although the breakdown of where this gold actually goes internally is rather less certain – hence the seeming anomalies in the nation’s estimated consumption figures from the big precious metals consultancies like Metals Focus and GFMS.

West and Central African focused gold miner, Randgold Resources, invariably provides updates on its key operations in the runup to the big Mining Indaba meeting in Cape Town alongside which the company, now traditionally. announces it Q4 and prior year figures. We’ve already reported here on the big new Kibali mine, which has been built in a remote part of the north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo which is due to become the company’s largest gold mine, but up until now the Loulo-Gounkoto complex in Mali has been the company’s largest operation in terms of gold production.

Ehe company says its Loulo-Gounkoto gold mining complex is on track to improve on its record performance in 2016, with last year’s production expected to reach a new peak and at lower cash costs of production, Chiaka Berthe, the company’s general manager of its West African operations, said to the media in Bamako, the Malian capital..

Speaking at the quarterly update for local media, Berthe said this positioned the complex strongly to continue rolling out its 10-year business plan, which targets production in excess of 600,000 ounces per year.

Berthe announced that the Malian ministry of mines had approved the development of a super pit at the Gounkoto opencast mine. The existing mining convention is being reviewed to accommodate this new investment.

Also at the briefing, Randgold chief executive Mark Bristow said the company’s continuing investment in Mali had shown the way for others to follow, and the current development of new mines would bring additional production on line and increase the already considerable contribution the mining industry makes to the country’s economy.

Group regional manager West Africa Mahamadou Samake also highlighted the importance of maintaining a fiscal and regulatory environment capable of attracting investment and re-investment in the mining sector.

“It is therefore imperative that the current mining code review is undertaken with this objective in mind, and any proposed changes should be made in light of the code’s relative attractiveness compared to surrounding countries which are competing for the same exploration and investment dollars. This is particularly important in coping with the challenges inherent in developing and operating a mine in an infrastructurally challenged country like Mali, and the difficulty of finding replacement reserves. The government should focus on working with the industry to maintain Mali’s position as one of the premier destinations for mining investment in West Africa,” Samake said.

Bristow also appealed to Mali to consult with its neighbours in finding a cross-border solution to the growing problem of illegal mining. In some parts of Mali this was now out of control, he said, and the damage to property and resources, if it was allowed to continue, would discourage global investors.

He noted that Randgold and the Malian fiscal authorities were working together to resolve their outstanding tax and TVA issues.

The company’s full Q4 and FY2017 operational results and financials are due to be released next Monday, when Bristow will make his presentation in Cape Town.

My latest article on the Sharps Pixley website looks at gold’s performance over the past week with it affected positively and negatively by conflicting statements on U.S. policy on the dollar at the World Economic Forum in Davos, but culminating in gold being held marginally below the psychologically important $1,350 level at the week’s end through activity in the gold futures and currency markets.

With potentially conflicting comments re. the weakness of otherwise of The U.S. dollar from U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and President Trump, the gold market didn’t know which way to run. Mnuchin had to backtrack, but not particularly convincingly, on his weaker dollar being beneficial to the U.S. economy statement lest he be accused of talking the dollar down in conflict with U.S. assurances that it would not do so. President Trump’s Davos statement suggested he was in favour of a stronger dollar, contrary to his earlier position on the currency, and following this the dollar rose, and gold fell on Thursday. But then the former reverted to lower levels in Friday afternoon trade in the U.S. and gold rose back above $1,350 before activity in the futures markets and gentle dollar support brought gold back to heel and the yellow metal ended the week a fraction under the key $1,350 level.

To an impartial (relatively) external observer of the market the gold price did appear to be trying to rebound back above $1,350 but kept being knocked back again. Whether it can build sufficient momentum to breach the $1,350 level permanently next week remains to be seen, but one suspects it will do so barring any major adverse news or data.

So far this year precious metals have all done well as Nick Laird’s bar chart from www.goldchartsrus.com shows (below). The bar chart shows the relative performances of the four major precious metals, the HUI (the NYSE ARCA Gold Bugs index) and Nick’s Silver 7 index tracking seven major silver stocks and the stock indices have generally outperformed the metals which are their key drivers. As can be seen platinum is by far the best performer year to date, but all have done pretty well given the year is only just over 3 weeks old. We suspect that Silver and the Silver 7 Index will ultimately outperform the others – however we would have said that in 2017 too – and ever-unpredictable silver ended the year as performing far more poorly than gold, and particularly palladium which was far and away one of the best assets of any type to hold last year.

As readers of my writings here will know I am anticipating precious metals to do well this year – except perhaps palladium which may have risen too far too fast in 2017. But I don’t anticipate any of them doing spectacularly well with rises pretty much in line with gold’s 2017 performance (See:Precious metals price predictions for 2018 – gold, silver, pgms) , but this year stocks may comfortably well outperform the metals assuming the general trajectory for both is upwards. The key may well be dollar strength and if the Trump Administration sees exports picking up, and imports falling, due to a weaker dollar, then the engineered decline in the dollar index may be allowed, or even encouraged, to continue. This process may well be mitigated though by similar effective currency devaluations among competitor nations or areas as others seek to contain any competitive disadvantage with their own export businesses.

Here’s GFMS’ latest outlook on gold from the new update for their 2017 Gold Survey incorporating 2017 Q3 results:

Gold prices started 2018 on an upbeat note, benefiting from a sinking dollar on softer economic data and concerns that the United States may pull out of NAFTA.

We believe that the geopolitical climate and equity markets will continue to support gold’s role as a risk hedge.

In the physical markets, Indian demand is set to remain at levels similar to 2017, while Chineseinvestment demand will likely to pick up if we see gold’s price momentum going forward. We expect gold prices to average $1,360/oz and hit a 2018 peak of over $1,500/oz later in the year.

Our forecast discounts three Fed rate hikes, although a potential overheating from the effect of the new tax reform could lead to more aggressive tightening, limiting gold’s upside.

The full GFMS survey may be downloaded free of charge to corporate email addresses at the following link:

In its latest analysis, The World Gold Council concludes that bitcoin is no substitute for gold as a long term store of wealth – it is altogether too volatile.

We have seen bitcoin collapse from close to $20,000 to below $10,000 at one stage and it seems to be trying to make a recovery, but could be stalling at current levels – still way too high in our opinion. A return to the rising pattern needs confidence in its growth potential and that will have been dented very severely.

A summary of the World Gold Council’s findings follows with a link to the full report at the end:

Bitcoin’s parabolic price rise was the big story of 2017 – putting the spotlight on the cryptocurrency market. While gold’s performance was a solid 13%, it was a fraction of the 13-fold increase of bitcoin by the end of the year.

Some commentators went as far as to claim cryptocurrencies could replace gold. Cryptocurrencies may become an established part of the financial system. But, in our view, gold is very different from cryptocurrencies, as gold:

is less volatile

has a more liquid market

trades in an established regulatory framework

has a well understood role in an investment portfolio

has little overlap with cryptocurrencies on many sources of demand and supply.

Despite anecdotal comments from well-regarded financial commentators that gold prices and gold demand are suffering at the expense of cryptocurrencies, there isn’t any quantifiable evidence that gold holdings are directly suffering from competition from cryptocurrencies. The weakness in physical demand in 2017 – for example, the paltry sales of US Eagles – is largely explained by the steady march higher of the S&P 500. Other established gold markets – such as China – saw healthy levels of demand. Overall, the level of the gold price in 2017 appears to be consistent with drivers of the past few years and is showing no signs of suffering from crypto-competition.

Another factor to consider is competition within cryptocurrencies themselves. There are currently over 1,400 cryptocurrencies available and, while bitcoin is the largest by far, new technology could have devastating effects on the value and supply of any of the cryptocurrencies, including bitcoin.

Blockchain technology, the distributed ledger mechanism that underpins cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, is genuinely innovative and could have wide-ranging applications across financial services and beyond. In the gold market, various players are exploring blockchain in the context of transforming gold into a ‘digital asset’, tracking gold provenance across the supply chain, and introducing efficiencies into post-trade settlement processes. Such applications are typically built on private blockchains operated by trusted parties rather than using bitcoin or other ‘public blockchains’.

Chart 2: Bitcoin’s price volatility is very high

Gold and Bitcoin supply

At a high level, there are some similarities between the supply profile of gold and cryptocurrencies. The stock of bitcoins, for example, increases in number at a rate of approximately 4% per annum, and is engineered to slowly decline to zero growth around the year 2140. While gold can be mined without a date limit, its production rate has been quite small and steady. Approximately 3,200 tonnes of gold have been mined on average, each year, adding about 1.7% to the total stock of gold ever mined. Bitcoin’s future diminishing growth rate and ultimate finite quantity are clearly attractive attributes, as is gold’s scarcity and marginal annual growth.

Analysis and insights on why cryptocurrencies are no substitute for gold

In a year when the S&P 500 hit all-time highs, gold also held strong, finishing 2017 up 13.5 percent, according to the World Gold Council. Gold’s annual gain was the largest since 2010, outperforming all major asset classes other than stocks. Contributing to this gain was a weaker U.S. dollar, stock indices hitting new highs and geopolitical instability, all of which fueled uncertainty. Investors continued to add gold to their portfolios to manage risk exposure, with gold-backed ETFs seeing $8.2 billion of inflows last year.

The World Gold Council (WGC) recently released its annual outlook on the yellow metal identifying four key market trends it believes will support positive gold performance in 2018, and we agree. Below I summarize the report for you and add some of my own thoughts on gold’s trajectory.

Key Trends Influencing Gold in 2018

1. A year of synchronized global economic growth
Economies are on the rise with global growth increasing in 2017 and on track to continue the trend this year. China and India, two of the world’s largest consumers of gold, will see their economies and incomes grow due to the implementation of new economic policies. WGC research shows that as incomes rise, the demand for gold jewelry and gold-containing technology tends to rise as well. Investment and consumer demand for the yellow metal results in a lower correlation to other mainstream financial assets, such as stocks, making it an effective portfolio diversifier.

2. Shrinking balance sheets and rising interest rates
Expectations are for the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates three times this year and shrink its balance sheet by allowing $50 billion in Treasuries and mortgage-backed securities to mature each month. Over the past decade, central banks pumped trillions into the global economy and cut interest rates, allowing asset values to break records and market volatility to reach record lows.

With these banks reining in expansionary policies in 2018 and hiking rates as global debt increases, market volatility may go up again, making gold a more attractive asset. According to WGC research, when real rates are between zero and 4 percent, gold’s returns are positive and its volatility and correlation with other mainstream financial assets are below long-run averages.

3. Frothy asset prices
As the WGC points out, not only did asset prices hit multi-year highs around the world in 2017, but the S&P is still sitting at an all-time high. This rosy environment saw investors seeking out additional risks, hoping for additional returns. A continued search for yield has “fueled rampant asset price growth elsewhere,” the report explains. This includes exposure to lower quality companies in the credit markets as well as investments in China.

Although the bull market could very well continue throughout 2018, some analysts and investors alike are understandably cautious about just how much risk exposure to continue taking on. That’s where gold comes in. As you can see in the chart below, the price of the yellow metal tends to increase during periods of systemic risk. Should global financial markets correct, investors could benefit from having an exposure to gold in their portfolio. Historically, gold has reduced losses during periods of distress or instability in the markets.

4. Greater market transparency, efficiency, and access
Financial markets have become more transparent and efficient over the past decade, with new products broadening access for all kinds of investors. Last year the London Bullion Market Association launched a trade-data reporting initiative and the London Metal Exchange launched a suite of exchange-traded contracts intending to improve price transparency, according to the WGC.

In fact, momentum is building in India to develop a national spot exchange to make the market less complicated and fragmented. In addition, more progress in gold investing might be seen in Russia this year with the current 18 percent VAT on gold bars possibly being lifted. More easily accessible gold-backed investment vehicles should lead to more gold investors and transactions worldwide.

Now Could Be a Good Time to Add Gold to Your Portfolio

World Gold Council’s Chief Market Strategist, John Reade, said in his 2018 outlook for gold that, “Over the long run, income growth has been the most important driver of gold demand. And we believe the outlook here is encouraging.”

We couldn’t agree more. Gold has historically helped to improve portfolio risk-adjusted returns. It is a mainstream asset as liquid as other financial securities and its correlation to major asset classes has been low in both expansionary and recessionary periods, as the WGC points out.

I’ve always advocated a 10 percent weighting in gold in a portfolio – with 5 percent in bullion or jewelry and 5 percent in gold stocks or well managed gold mutual funds and ETFs. If you’re interested to learn more about gold, I encourage you to sign up for my blog, Frank Talk. Happy Investing!